


i can't shake my hunger (for you)

by kitkatwrites



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alcohol, Idiots in Love, M/M, Pining, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:20:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27567388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitkatwrites/pseuds/kitkatwrites
Summary: “Why do you play volleyball?” Kei asks Kenma during a watermelon break. They’re at a training camp and Kei is a first-year and Kenma is a second-year and neither are very sure of where they’re going after high school, but they’ve got their whole lives to figure it out. Or at least, until the watermelon break ends.Kenma shrugs. “Never really had a reason to quit. Besides, it can be fun. Occasionally,” he adds after a pause. “Usually when I’m not moving a lot. I run through energy so easily.” Kei nods in understanding because he, too, has horrible stamina.“Do you play video games?” Kenma asks after a few seconds of silence, staring at his shoes. White with red stripes. Or red with white blocks, depending on how you look at it.
Relationships: Kozume Kenma/Tsukishima Kei
Comments: 3
Kudos: 85





	i can't shake my hunger (for you)

**Author's Note:**

> Hello I've fallen into tsukkiken hell and I hope I can drag a few more with me cause it's very lonely down here.
> 
> Title is from Strawberries & Cigarettes by Troye Sivan
> 
> Edit 12/25: fixed some grammar errors :)

“Why do you play volleyball?” Kei asks Kenma during a watermelon break. They’re at a training camp and Kei is a first-year and Kenma is a second-year and neither are very sure of where they’re going after high school, but they’ve got their whole lives to figure it out. Or at least, until the watermelon break ends.

Kenma shrugs. “Never really had a reason to quit. Besides, it can be fun. Occasionally,” he adds after a pause. “Usually when I’m not moving a lot. I run through energy so easily.” Kei nods in understanding because he, too, has horrible stamina.

“Do you play video games?” Kenma asks after a few seconds of silence, staring at his shoes. White with red stripes. Or red with white blocks, depending on how you look at it.

How does Kei want to look at this question? Is it just idle conversation? Yamaguchi says that he’s a horrible conversation partner, maybe Kenma’s just trying to fill the time? Or…

No.

Kenma is not coming onto him, they hardly even know each other.

“Not really,” Kei responds, “I’m not very good at them.”

“Want to learn?” Kenma offers, still staring at his white and red, red and white shoes.

Kei nods and Kenma shuffles closer. Now they’re close, close. Extra close for emphasis, because Kei’s never been so close to someone he hardly knows, and yet strangely, he doesn’t hate it. Yes, strange, Kei decides, because this is simply a friendly exchange between friends. More emphasis on friends.

Kenma teaches him how to play “a pretty easy game,” as he calls it. Said game is Mario Kart and Kei spends ten minutes falling off the same spot on Rainbow Road and yelling at the turtle guy before, miraculously, Kenma laughs. It’s a huff, really, but it means the world to Kei. He wonders how he can get Kenma to laugh even more.

~

“Do you want to watch me play Mortal Kombat?” Kenma asks, rustling his futon as he adjusts his seated position. Kei’s a second-year now and Kenma’s a third-year. Kei never figured out what he wanted to do after the watermelon break ended, but he’s beginning to think that he likes volleyball more than he lets on.

Kei nods and scoots closer, his bicep brushing Kenma’s shoulder. He ignores the shivers that run up his spine at the contact, and focuses on Kenma’s game.

“You smell like strawberries,” Kenma mumbles. Kei’s mouth opens in shock as he tries to figure out what to say.

“I—”

“I like it,” Kenma admits.

“Oh.”

They settle back into a comfortable silence, the only noise coming from Kenma’s game.

“Can I kiss you?” Kenma asks after a few minutes with all the nonchalance of someone who doesn’t always care what people think. Kei, with only the fake nonchalance of not caring, panics. “You can say no,” Kenma adds.

“No no no,” Kei tries to figure out his words, but his tongue is being particularly traitorous at the moment.

“No as in ‘don’t kiss me?’” Kenma asks.

“Please kiss me,” Kei says through a desperate exhale.

Kenma pauses his game, sets it down on the bedding, and looks up at Kei. _There’s a fire in his eyes_ , Kei realizes. _He wants this just as much as I do._

Kei initiates, somehow. He leans in too close too quickly but he’s never been kissed before so he can’t be blamed for his mistakes, really. Their lips press together and Kei can hear the small smack as Kenma parts their lips and takes control over the kiss.

It’s a bit awkward, what with Kei being so much taller, and the fact that he has no idea what he’s doing. They continue to press gentle kisses to each other’s lips before Kenma pulls away, and Kei is embarrassed to admit that he chases Kenma’s lips.

“You even taste like strawberries,” Kenma says with the smile of someone who just tore down someone’s walls and built them up again in a style that suited him in the same breath. Kei thinks he’s in love.

~

The next year Kei is a third-year and Kenma has graduated. Kei’s never been more lonely.

~

They meet again in Kei’s first year of college. Kuroo and Bokuto are hosting a party for the simple reason of being able to get outrageously drunk amidst those they’ve come to call friends, of which Kei is a part of.

He shows up with Yamaguchi and Yachi as backup because there’s no way he’s getting through the party without some kind of buffer, but the two of them immediately abandon Kei the second they step through the door.

“We’ll get drinks!” Yamaguchi calls to Kei, who _definitely_ didn’t agree to be abandoned for drinks while he quickly loses all semblance of sanity, getting jostled and pushed around by extremely drunk volleyball players and ex-volleyball players.

Pushing his way through the crowd, he spots Lev, who has somehow managed to fit all of his limbs onto a loveseat in the corner while he facetimes with who he assumes is Yaku. His assumption is proven correct when he hears a slew of Russian emitting from Lev’s phone before the man wails “You know I can’t speak russian, Mori-san,” prompting Yaku to cackle. Lev takes another sip from his concerningly large glass full of some mystery concoction probably put together by Kuroo, the scariest and meanest mixologist Kei has ever had the misfortune of meeting.

Deciding he’s had enough, he turns away and makes his way towards the bar, which is probably a horrible decision since he can see that Kuroo is the one manning said bar because Kei’s prayers to get Kuroo struck by lightning have never been answered.

“Tsukki!” Kuroo calls, motioning for Kei to come closer, “come try this!” Kei walks over, eyeing the drink warily. It’s a pale green and looks like it could knock him out with one sip.

“No thanks,” he refuses with a shake of his head, “that looks terrifying.”

“It’s a recipe from our dear Akaashi,” Kuroo argues, “you wouldn’t want to upset him, now would you?” Kuroo grins, pushing the drink towards Kei. Huffing, Kei grabs the stem, lifts the drink up, and tips it back into his mouth.

The drink hits his tongue, and Kei is hit with the realization that the taste vaguely resembles that of motor oil. He spits it back into the glass and stares at Kuroo with a terrified look on his face.

“What the _hell_ is in this?” He shouts, partly out of a need for Kuroo to hear him over the pounding music, mostly out of sheer terror and anger.

“Absinthe!” Kuroo answers cheerfully, “it’s called a _Death in the Afternoon_.”

“Why?” Kei’s voice cracks, the need to cleanse his palette growing exponentially by the second.

“It’s fun!” Kuroo shrugs, grin growing wider, if that’s even possible. “You should’ve seen your face, it looked like you saw Chibi-chan and Kageyama-kun pull off another one of their annoying quick sets.”

Kei’s face heats up as he flounders for a reply. “I do _not_ look like that,” he refutes, “and there’s nothing fun about absinthe, it’s a revolting, disgusting, sickening--oh, hello Akaashi.” Kei cuts off his rant once the raven-haired man comes into sight, giving him a nod.

“Did you drink the absinthe?” Akaashi asks him, leaning his forearms on the bar.

“Um, yeah,” Kei scrambles for something positive to say about the worst drink he’s ever had in his entire life. Granted, he hasn’t had many outside of that one time he got outrageously drunk with the rest of the third years after their last nationals, but at least he didn’t feel like he would vomit from one sip--at least, until he woke up the next morning.

“It was…”

“Terrible,” Akaashi supplies.

“Yeah, it--wait, what?” Kei stares at the man with a confused look on his face.

“It tastes horrible, doesn’t it?” Akaashi asks, turning to Kuroo. “Can you make me another one?” Kuroo nods cheerfully, already pulling out a concerningly large bottle of absinthe.

“Why…” Kei trails off, not entirely sure what to say.

“Why would I keep drinking it?” Akaashi fills in the rest of Kei’s question, who nods. “You get used to it after a while,” Akaashi shrugs casually as if he hadn’t just admitted to completely frying his tastebuds via the worst alcoholic drink in existence.

“You’re here for Kozume, aren’t you?” Akaashi observes, changing the subject as Kuroo sets a drink in front of him. He takes a sip, his face only mildly contorting into one of disgust, before taking another sip.

“Uhh…” Kei says with all the elegance of being asked about his crush with no prior warning.

“He’s in the bedroom,” Akaashi tells him, taking another sip. Kei remains frozen, and Akaashi turns to him with a raised eyebrow. “Well?” He prompts, “go, shoo, go get kissed.” He makes a shooing motion with his free hand while Kuroo makes kissy noises in the background.

Face heating up, Kei sets his drink on the bar before speedwalking through the crowd to what he hopes is the bedroom.

He doesn’t bother knocking because he knows Kenma won’t be able to hear him anyways over the music and how loud everyone is, so he opens the door without preamble to see Kenma curled up on the middle of the bed, the screen illuminating his face in the dimly lit room.

“Um,” Kei blinks, unsure of what to say. “Hi,” he says awkwardly before mentally punting his body into the fiery sun for acting like such an idiot.

Kenma looks up from his game to stare at Kei with a blank expression on his face. “Wanna watch me play?” He asks as a greeting as if they’re close friends who see each other every day instead of near-strangers who kissed once and then didn’t see each other for over a year.

Kei nods anyways, walking over to sit on the edge of the bed, several feet away from Kenma.

Kenma snorts. “You can sit closer than that,” he mumbles, “or else you won’t be able to see my screen.”

“Okay,” Kei whispers, scooting closer to sit shoulder to shoulder with Kenma. He pulls his knees up to his chin and wraps his arms around his legs, feeling awkward beyond belief. Gods, Kei was supposed to be mean and aloof, what happened to him? Blushing demurely at the thought of sitting next to his crush--who he’s already kissed, by the way--and watching him play video games.

Pathetic.

They sit in silence for a couple of minutes before Kenma pauses his game and turns to Kei. “Wanna make out?” He asks, and Kei gets hit with a very strong sense of déjà vu.

“Um--” he stammers as his brain ceases all functioning. “Yes,” he squeaks out.

Kenma sets his game down and grabs the back of Kei’s neck, pulling him in for a kiss. Their lips meet in the middle and Kei can feel the other man’s lips smile against his own as he licks along the seam of Kei’s lips. Kei opens his mouth, allowing Kenma to slip his tongue inside, exploring his mouth.

Kei groans, grabbing a strand of Kenma’s hair and tugging. Kenma groans back, snapping Kei out of his haze.

“Wait,” he pulls back to stare at Kenma, his cheeks flushed red and hair mussed up. “What are we?” He asks desperation laced in his voice from being in a state of limbo for well over a year.

“What do you want to be?” Kenma asks.

“I--” Kei freezes, unsure of himself. “I mean, it would--um,” he stammers, face bright red with embarrassment.

“What?” Kenma asks, a smile pulling at the corner of his lips, and oh what Kei would give to see a full smile on his face.

“Boyfriends,” he spits out, “I want to be boyfriends. Dating. In love.” Kei cuts himself off, breathing heavily. He’s terrified--his heart is beating faster than ever, but he’s ecstatic. He just confessed to his longtime crush. Kei has to repeat it to fully understand what he had just said. _I just confessed to my longtime crush. I just confessed to my longtime crush. I just confessed to--_

“Okay,” Kenma shrugs, “then let’s be boyfriends.”

Kei pauses, staring at Kenma with an incredulous look on his face. “Just like that?” he asks, astounded. “We danced around each other for over a year, yet you’re immediately fine with a relationship?”

“Yeah?” Kenma says, looking confused. “Why wouldn’t I not be okay with a relationship?”

“I thought you didn’t like me back,” Kei confesses.

“But I kissed you,” Kenma says like it’s the most natural thing in the world. “I thought it would have been obvious by then.”

“Then why didn’t you ask to be boyfriends then?” Kei asks, head spinning with all the new information flooding his brain.

“I thought you didn’t like me back,” Kenma shrugs.

“Didn’t li--Kenma, did you forget that I kissed you back?” Kei asks in a stunned voice. “I was very much in love with you, and have been for quite some time.”

“Okay,” Kenma nods, “then let’s date.”

“Oh my gods,” Kei groans, falling face-first into the bedding.

“What?” Kenma asks.

“Nothing,” Kei replies, voice muffled by the sheets, “everything’s fine.” Everything is clearly _not_ fine, but Kei can’t quite find the words to describe how he’s feeling.

“Okay,” Kenma says casually because Kenma is very rarely phased by anything, this moment included. “Wanna watch me play?”

Kei nods, face rubbing against the sheets. “Sure,” he answers, “anything you want.”

**Author's Note:**

> hey I'm on [twitter](https://twitter.com/gr1lledcheesy)


End file.
